Time to tear up the bible and eat the dogs – Auckland alt-folk outfit Bond Street Bridge present a special performance of their multimedia song cycle ‘The Explorer’s Club: Antarctica’ at th Orokonui Ecosanctuary. On Friday 28 June The Ecosanctuary will shiver along to sweet harmonies, jangling guitars, and tales of courage, endurance, and Edwardian pluck in a show described by the Dominion Post as ‘a perfect evening of music.’
Inspired by the incredible stories of Captain Scott and Sir Ernest Shackleton, songwriter Sam Prebble has recruited a band of seasoned folk musicians from the Auckland underground and produced a series of stirring vignettes drawn from the diaries and letters of these stalwart adventurers. Tales of shipwreck , frostbite, survival , and stoical, stiff-upper-lip freezing in the snow are presented as a combination of spoken-word storytelling and original folk songs, with arrangements ranging from delicate vocal harmonies to foot-stomping ballads.
The songs are illustrated with heritage images used with the kind permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, combined with original mixed-media illustrations from Auckland artist Emily Cater. These photos and illustrations are projected around the band as they play, bringing the characters and stories to life.
2013 marks the 100th anniversary of the end of Captain Scott’s ill-fated Terra Nova expedition, with news of the explorer’s death reaching the world via the port of Oamaru in February 1913. Bond Street Bridge have taken this show on a 30-date tour throughout the country to mark this anniversary, including a performance in Oamaru’s historic precinct, sold-out shows in the Wellington and Auckland Fringe Festivals and a special appearance at a packed Dunedin Fringe Festival Club. The shows have received rave reviews and saw the band awarded ‘best music’ at the 2013 NZ Fringe Festival Awards, and Bond Street Bridge will be appearing at Arts Festivals around New Zealand and Australia through the year.
Complementing the music at the Orokonui show, Dunedin-based writer Neville Peat will present a half-hour illustrated talk about the earliest attempts to reach the South Pole from the McMurdo Sound area during the Heroic Age of Antarctic exploration. His talk will feature Ernest Shackleton’s 1907 British Antarctic Expedition (ship Nimrod) and the sensational remake of whisky rediscovered intact under the Nimrod hut 100 years after its arrival at Cape Royds, Ross Island.
With a band of road-hardened troubadours, rousing stories of icy adventure, stunning heritage photographs and beautiful original illustrations, audiences can expect to be transported back to a time when hardship meant something, pluck was everything, and if the worst came to the worst, one could always eat the ponies.
What: Bond Street Bridge Presents The Explorers Club: Antarctica with a talk from Neville Peat
When: Friday 28 June 7pm
Where: Orokonui Ecosanctuary, 600 Blueskin Bay Road Waitati
Tickets: $20
